One Lucky Soul: OLS Reflections 48 — The Unpublished Edition

OLS Reflections 48 — The Unpublished Edition by Omar Cherif, One Lucky Soul

I once merrily expressed that whoever is going to someday inherit my unpublished notes will realise how entirely bonkers I was. But then it’ll be too late to do anything about it.

I have a Reflections file of around 168,000 words, which has been expanding since the day it was incepted. Some have been shared while others never saw the light — either I forgot them or chose not to publish them at the time they were written; possibly because it was too soon or not the appropriate time. I did previously share something similar in the Things I Never Told Anyone series. Then as I skim through the hundreds of reflections I found the following, all of which have never been published and are at least two years old.

Note that those are not even the most outrageous. You can only imagine the stuff you don’t get to see. Though someday you probably will. For timing is key.

Officially in the singular and ready to mingular.

  Did you know butterflies flap their wings to get your attention? True story.

I thought that only Egyptian cleaning women were so into speaking on their phones while working. But apparently Latinas cleaning women are equally into it.

“Do you know that some days I am have absolutely no money that I can barely feed myself? But you also know what? I’m happy from inside, you see. I actually left all I ever had to be Here. Now I wake up smiling to life, simply because I feel freed. In such times you can either laugh or cry. It all lies in our priorities and how we look at things. And I prefer laughing.” 

— Me venting to the Latina cleaning lady as she vacuums the carpet while looking at me with slightly indifferent eyes.

It is quite hard to give a compliment to a girl when she’s surrounded by three or four other girls.

Sometimes I question if I taught myself how to become totally fine with living on the edge.

Occasionally I share jokes about sex or drugs or whatever, and I’ve noticed a pattern. That depending of the obscenity, I would sometimes lose some followers. This always makes me giggle. If you have been following me — not because I’m a comedian, but because I offer a eclectic variety of posts — and you’re offended by the occasional joke I share to loosen up on myself and yourselves, my readers, then I’m happy you’re off the wagon. Simple.

On rare occasions, I freak myself out a little by thinking that I’m heading towards where none of my peers have gone before in life. No matter where that is. In those moments of retrospection I feel so far out and alienated from my fellow humans, that it kind of compiles me to think that I may not be from here, perhaps a different solar system or galaxy all together. One cannot feel so different without questioning why. Truly, I have never had many people I could relate to. So while most end up following others’ paths, there are some of us who dare exploring uncharted territories and create their own trails. 

This very uncertainty is the small, and fair, price to pay for all the novelty. Because when nothing is certain everything becomes possible.

In Egypt, instead of eradicating poverty and hunger the ones in charge chose to eradicate the poor and hungry.

Can you work in politics while still have a goodnight sleep?

We can’t expect long-term change from short-term efforts.

All throughout my 20s the last line of blow was often accompanied with relief, while the last line of smack was always accompanied with anxiety. Speaking of which, did you know that ‘smack’ originates from the 1940s, probably as an alteration of the Yiddish schmeck, ‘a sniff’.

As a boy I was sometimes told that I look like that kid from Vice Versa — Fred Savage... just looked him up. Then at 10-11, a few girls were convinced that I look like Rick Astley. Then later it was Richard Gere and David Duchovny. Around the same time came Eric Cantona. Some Jesus when I let my hair and beard grow long. Finally it was Andy Kaufman and he was the latest. Then it kind of stopped. Apparently I don’t look like anyone now. Phew.

Some days ago I came across channel 235 Science and a show called Outrageous Act of Science. I kept it on for four hours straight, which is more TV-watching than the past six years combined since the day I quit cold turkey.

I’m not much of a play-by-the-rules kind of guy. I create my own rules; then I either follow, break, or disregard them all together.

One day I woke up to find that my Facebook feeds are flooded with Egyptians posting: “Mabrouk” or “Congratulation” for Egypt. Some thanking God, others are posting photos of the flag. I thought maybe Sisi had been removed by an uprising or something or they have freed a few thousand political prisoners. But apparently, that day Egypt beat Ghana in soccer and has been qualified for the World Cup for the first time since 1990. Yeah.

Now of course this is some kind of achievement. But the excessive reaction shows that with all the political and economical problems Egypt is currently facing, most people are in dire need of some good news — whatever it may be. So even though the dollar rate has skyrocketed from 7 L.E to 18 in a matter of a couple of years, the Pound — the currency — has floated, and the general populace cannot even afford to eat. But hey, our soccer team won. Yey! Now we have a reason to celebrate.   

As much as I see where this need for happiness is coming from, as much as I think some Egyptian people are plagued with a certain degree of infantilism. The end result is that from one side we have a country full of superstitious 60 and 70-year old adults who had never matured in real, and on the other side we have the youth who represent over 60% of the population, perhaps 90 percent of whom are currently depressed from what has been going on — politically and economically.

Well, it certainly is a beautiful country with so much to offer. It just happens to attract rulers who are maniacs. Let us hope for the best.

Verifiable Truth: If you come across something on the Internet which you do not like or agree with, you can simply ignore it and go on with you life. Ta-Da!